An Apocalypse Rising Ch. 02

Her words were pointed, as though she were putting forth immutable truths. "That is not this. That is not creating, for instance, things that would never possibly evolve to be without using magic to absolutely twist physical law just to see the result; that is the type of she advocated. If we were to truly master magic, we had to brave it without limits."

"She was rightly shunned. Even those that were curious shied away because they could see the downward spiraling path of her position. Her disdain for our reticence turned to hatred for her people, and, to a lesser extent all people. We were holding her back, and if we could not be convinced, we were no better than those in the more primitive reaches. It was rumored that she'd already started her work on a small scale, but with Adar being a closed environment, she was limited. When the Council began a formal inquiry, she banished herself. After that, the matter was dropped."

Neral tried to control her anger. This was precisely why magic was so tightly controlled and its misuse punished so severely. "So what you are saying is there is now an exiled mage in the world, who, in a snit of under-appreciation is raising an army of abominations to prove her, and magic's superiority?"

She stood, accepting the judgment of the emotion beneath the words. "You have summarized things well enough." She looked to her son. "Whatever will come, I am unsure if I can do this alone. I need your help. I regret bringing this into your life, but I have no choice. Know that, even so, you are free to refuse me."

He spread his arms outward as he shrugged. "How can I? My mother comes to me and begs me for my help when all you have ever done is give to me? Even if that was not the truth, if you fail, how much life will there be for any of us anyway?"

He turned to Neral and she saw the resolve in his eyes and the pain in his v0ice. "I have to go."

She couldn't look away from his expression as her heart twisted. She could not bear to see him go, but she knew he was right. She saw the look she now carried on the faces of other spouses as she led their loves as her troops to parts unknown. Her heart carried that pain beneath her stoic expression each time her father went off to battle.

Including the time he didn't come back.

We have to go," Bryana said fiercely, unwilling to stay behind as he left, and as anxious to face an enemy as the person she once was would have been. "The cause is just, Magister. My power is yours to wield." The fire in her eyes gave way to tenderness as she looked to Deres. "Time to show you I know what to do with all you've taught me, love." He opened his mouth to protest, but she simply shook her head. "Leave without me and I will find a way to follow. You know I will, so think of it as me being safer going with you."

He knew it was so, so he said nothing.

"Yes, we have to go." Neral now spoke with authority, sounding every bit the leader of her kingdom's armies. Looking to Maylin, she did not flinch. "If this all comes to pass I will have to face them anyway in what will likely be a slaughter and not one that favors me. It makes more sense to try to stop it while there is still a chance." She looked to her two. "And, where they go, I will follow. You do whatever it is you need to do to prepare and I will make what arrangements I must. We leave tomorrow at noon. I assume we'll be transporting...rapidly?"

Maylin nodded, gathering the meaning.

"If you'll excuse me, I have arrangements to make." Now that she had a goal and a plan, there was no reason to linger, so she didn't.

***

Deres found his mother wandering the back courtyard as the sun began to set, head swiveling casually to take everything in as she walked the polished stone pathway. "They grow better in the gardens of home, I think."

He bent to smell one with violet petals that spiraled upward "They grow well enough here. Besides. I can go to where there are miles and miles of them. "No garden there can manage that."

"What arrangements did Neral have to make?"

"Speaking to the queen to inform her that she was leaving for a time, and probably to enlist some help."

Maylin smirked. "Inform her of what? I'd be interested to listen in on that."

"Truth enough. There are rumors of a disturbance on the border and she is taking a scouting party to investigate."

The military commander would do this here?"

"Queen Evaline knows well that her General does not lead from behind."

"I imagine she does not." Maylin began to laugh at humor at first known only to her. "I still think you are insane, Deres, so needing to come back here to have your life."

He smiled at her. "Is that why you haven't come to visit? So comfortable that you cannot get by without electricity anymore?"

She studied his face and, finding humor and no accusation, she dropped her gaze back to the wildflowers. "I had always intended to. I would have soon without this. You seem settled and to have found your place. I was waiting for that. Sooner and I feel I would have been a hindrance. You left to find your own path. You deserved to do that before I came calling."

He came closer to her. "The woman who gave me life in every way save birthing me is not a hindrance."

"Even so." She paused. "I know the answer because I have listened to you speak of them for so long, and now I have seen how you look at them, but, as your mother, I need to ask if you are happy."

He thought of them. He thought of the life he built. "So very."

She nodded at the answer she expected. "Then, while I still think it an act of insanity, you were correct to return. And I am sorry to take you away from your life here for this."

"Neral is right. There might be no life here to have otherwise. Are you happy?"

She gave it a lot of thought. "For a long time there was just me, then there was just us. Going back to just me took some getting used to. But I have my work and my friends. Yes, I am."

"Then all is as it should be."

She closed the distance to embrace him. "It is not," she brushed her fingers through his hair with such ferocity that his head bobbed on his neck, "not until you have hair I can muss, foolish boy."

***

The three of them slept little though none of them were tired by sunrise. They curled closely to one another in the oversized bed, planning some, but mostly whispering the things that needed to be said in case there was no time later. They each tended to last minute things in the home. Neral wanted to give Tessa some last instructions and to say her good-byes. Given how their own relationship had evolved, Neral had found it necessary to be more forthright with her about what was happening.

Because of that, Tessa found it more difficult than all the times before to watch her go, but House Jaye had been a military family for generations, and House Jovis had served them almost as long, so she knew as well as Neral did how to straighten her spine and wish Mistress well. The gentle soul was iron when need be.

Bryana stayed close to Neral. She couldn't help herself. As much as she was lover, after the change Neral was, in some small way, her charge. It was to her that she'd owed the debt of her crimes and that left its mark.

Deres spent some of his time with Cassea. She would be in charge of the clinics in his absence. She knew enough about the potions and poultices now to make do, but, for things more serious, she was allowed to send them to a healer that the House would pay for. She listened as they walked and he talked, though there really wasn't anything about covering his absence that wasn't glaringly obvious to her, so, like the magicians of her childhood, she waited for her cues to acknowledge him politely.

When they got to the door and to the walkway beyond he saw Neral at the gate, on her steed, in her full, gleaming armor and his breath caught in his throat. The horse was one of her favorites, Stenna, her black coat shining almost as the armor did. Neral looked majestic and ready to take on an army alone. Bryana watched him watch them both and the corner of her mouth turned upward knowingly.

"Is there anything else, or are you just going to stand there and ogle them all day?"

He turned, making her his focus. He shook his head. "No. You'll do fine."

"Of course. If not for the magic, one could train any person or several types of primate to do what you do."

Oddly enough, her acerbic tongue was a balm just then. "Just so you know... if I don't survive, you'll know because the binding will break. You'll be free."

Other than a barely perceptible nod, her features were inscrutable for a time. When he was about to step away, she broke the silence. "You will return." It was a statement of fact. "I have grown quite...accustomed...to my work, and my hating to love you and loving to hate you, and I don't like change."

He shook his head as he laughed at her. "Yes. Because everything in the world is about you."

She looked at him like she was humoring the hopelessly dim. "Only because somehow, and in some way, everything is."

***

They rode in silence until they reached the clearing, well away from prying eyes. In a semicircle facing the path they knew the three would take were a dozen troops, all female, and equally divided between infantry, cavalry, and archers. Neral had gone to Major Kress even before coming to the queen, only telling her that a mission was to be undertaken mostly in secret and that she needed a dozen volunteers that were skilled, willing to die for that mission, and, live or die, could be trusted never to speak of it until they went to the Goddess no matter what they saw and endured.

Some of them she knew by sight, some not, but it wasn't necessary for her to because she trusted Kress. They snapped to attention, knowing full well they were being inspected even as the general trotted up. Even the horse's movements were formal and measured. Bryana and Deres stayed back. This was Neral's time and place. She guided her steed next to Kress, continuing to look upon them as they did not flinch. "Some of them look...young."

Kress, older than Neral by better than a decade, had rejected promotion because she hated any military duty that didn't involve being on the ground with the troops. Beyond her current rank were meetings, briefings, and the rest of the bits that, while she knew they were necessary to good order, they were useless to her. Her hair shaved off regularly, leaving a black with a little gray stubble that drew the eye to her hazel ones and the long scar down her left jawline. "Not that young, it's just that we're old."

Speak for yourself," Neral told her. "I'm the youngest ever to hold my post, man or woman."

"Yes, sir."

"The ones I don't know are reliable are reliable?"

"I knew my orders, General."

Neral sounded slightly apologetic. "Of course you did."

"Don't fret, General. I knew you'd ask."

Neral inspected the line again, meeting the eye of each of them. "Major Kress assures me that you are among the best soldiers Erette has to offer. Is that so?"

The response was loud, crisp, and immediate. "Yes, General!"

"You are ready to face any enemy?"

"Yes, General!"

"You are ready to kill that enemy?"

"Yes, General!"

"You are ready to give your life so that enemy can be defeated?"

"Yes, General!"

"Excellent. You have been selected for a special mission. This mission may well save, not just Erette, but the world. What I am about to tell you requires your word that it will never be spoken of except for those who stand with you today; not to your spouse, not to your children, not to a priestess as a confessional on your deathbed an old woman. It requires your word on your life, your honor, and the honor of your House. Do I have it?"

"Yes, General!" The affirmation was perhaps the loudest of all.

She moved back and forth before the line, pausing for effect."Forbidden magics exist in the world. They exist and we are going to fight those that wield them as well as their creations so that they do not threaten other men, women, and children that cannot stand against them."

The eyes of several of the assembled darted to those next to them to gauge their reactions.

"We may be victorious. We may die. We may be stranded. I cannot say what will happen to any of us, save that we will face it together. If the uncertainty of the truly unknown is something you cannot bear, then you may return to your posts with no loss of honor in my eyes or of those who stand with you. I know that I ask of you something that has never been asked of others in your place."

"Stand away."

A heartbeat later. "No, General!"

She flushed with pride and felt the weight of their loyalty on her shoulders. "You honor me, my fellow soldiers. Now we march" she began, admittedly feeling a perverse pleasure at the notion of them witnessing some of that forbidden magic. It had been a secret that she'd grown to enjoy holding in a way.

From behind Brynn and Deres, Maylin appeared. Had the troops been paying attention they would have seen her literally appear from nowhere, handing her pack up to Deres before making her way well in front of the group, extending her arms, dress fluttering in the breeze, jeweled talismans in each hand that seemed to draw energy from her words and the sunlight.

Neral didn't know what she expected to see as Bryana and Deres guided their horses to either side of her as Kress moved between them and the troops. Thinking about it, perhaps Neral thought she would see clouds build, hear thunder clap, and see lightning snap all around them as reality was ripped asunder. What she didn't expect was seeing how the grass before them and mountains in the background seemed to ripple like a flag in this day's breeze.

Two steps forward from where Maylin stood, she vanished, bringing gasps from behind her.

"Steady, soldiers," Kress urged.

With an excited Bryana to her left, tense Deres on her right, and her finest soldiers behind her, she spurred Stenna forward.

To Be Continued...